Dawns Everlastin' (former title: Dusk Before Dawn) Book 2 (33 page)

By the time she'd helped
Agnes to change into a flannel nightgown, gotten her into bed, and
had talked the woman to sleep, nearly an hour had passed. Laura
returned to the parlor to find Roan completely dressed, his coat
and gloves on, and pacing the floor.

"Let it wait until the
morning."

Roan stopped short at the
sound of her voice. His haunted gaze riveted on her. "She
restin'?"

"She finally fell asleep."
Closing the distance between them, Laura placed a hand against his
chest. "I'm worried about you, Roan. If Lachlan turns on
you...."

With a groan of anguish,
Roan capped his skull with his hands. "I can't think
straight!"

"What's tearing you up?" she
asked in a whisper of a tone. "Roan, I know something's eating away
at your gut."

Lowering his hands, he
gestured his deepening sense of futility. "Sometimes...I swear I
know the mon as well as I know maself. Laura, I'm havin' the
bloodiest time believin' him crazed enough to go to
hospital."

Laura shivered. "I think
he's capable of anything."

"Aye, tis true, but...."
Releasing an exasperated breath, he walked in a complete circle. "I
know it sounds ludicrous, but I need to believe in him!"

"Roan...." Draping her arms
about his neck, Laura held him close to her trembling body. "I'm
scared, and I'm not even sure why. Don't go near that house
tonight. Not in the dark."

"Day or night," he sighed,
brushing the back of a gloved hand across her cheek, "doesn't make
a difference. I have to know wha' he's doin'."

"Then I'm going with
you."

"No. Stay wi'
Aggie."

"I'm going,
dammit!"

He lifted his hands in a
placating gesture. "All right, but it means I'll have you to worry
abou' there, as well."

Hastily donning her boots
and coat, she snatched up her shoulder purse from the couch, and
followed Roan out the door and to the van. He held the passenger
door open for her, shut it then walked around the front of the
vehicle. Laura trembled violently, from the cold, and her
trepidation of returning to Baird House. She clung to a slim hope
that she could somehow keep Roan from losing his temper with the
laird.

The laird. Lachlan Baird.
A
ghost.

The driver's door opened.
Roan climbed in behind the wheel. Laura was about to ask him once
again to reconsider, when searing cold slammed the length of her
body. For several seconds, her heart stopped, her brain shut down.
Her external senses became trapped in an inexplicable dark
void.

A spectral breath spilled
from the core of her being. Life returned to her eyes. Life in the
guise of rage.

Turning her head from Roan,
she opened her door and slid off the seat. "I'll be right
back."

* * *

Agnes woke with a start, a
hoarse gasp spilling past her dry lips. Pain radiated throughout
her chest. She attempted to sit up. It was as if a massive weight
had been placed atop her torso. Her arms and legs felt eerily
buoyant.

She stared wildly into the
darkness, her mind trying to will a scream. Movement stirred the
cool air by the right side of her face.

Roan!

The bottom of her two
pillows was pulled free.

Roan, help me!

A thought lanced her
brain.

Is ma Borgie in
trouble?

Why else would she feel such
fear?

Is he slippin’ away?
Leavin’ me?

What would she do without
her only child?

She'd secretly hoped for
grandchildren.

If he died, all her dreams
would die with him.

Roan...what's wrong wi'
me?

To lift her head but a few
inches off the remaining pillow proved an enormous
strain.

A burning sensation began
above her heart. She focused all her concentration on it. Was she
losing her mind, or was a phantom hand burrowing into her chest,
clutching her heart in an unmerciful grip?

Countless brilliant white
stars danced in front of her eyes.

Was her heart failing
her?

She wailed within the
confines of her skull.

Doctor Waikens had warned
her to avoid any more stress.

Was she going to die? Would
Borgie come out of the coma to learn that
she
had left
him?

She managed to release a
choked sound.

A guttural laugh echoed
within the room, and it was then, she realized that she was not
alone.

Laura...?

Every nerve in her became
inflamed with awareness. Her brain homed in on an ominous presence.
Terror tightened its strangulating fibers around her reasoning,
tightening and tightening, teetering her on the brink of
madness.

Lannie! You devil! Get
away, you devil!

Something soft fell over her
face, but the softness waned beneath tauntingly-slow increased
pressure. By the time she realized that her other pillow was the
object cutting off her air supply, it was too late.

Spasms seized her
oxygen-starved body. Her lessening heartbeat hammered against her
eardrums.

Lannie was killing
her.

She would die and his
vaporish presence would forever taint her soul.

He would deny her
everlasting peace.

Damn
yer...black...heart.

C
hapter 12

Roan couldn't take his gaze
off the chasm as he made his way across the field, toward the
headstones beneath the oak. A little voice in his head warned him
to flee the laird's land, abandon his plan to elicit Beth's
help.

Even the night air held an
element of foreboding. Whenever his imagination began to get the
better of him, he forced himself to remember how close he'd come to
making love to Laura in the bathtub.

Unfinished
business.

When he arrived at the
headstones, he was mildly surprised to find them righted. Had Beth
or Lachlan attended to them? It really didn't matter. The chasm was
all the reminder he needed.

Had Lannie's temper been as
uncontrollable when he'd been alive?

Shuddering, he crammed his
hands into his coat pockets and frowned at Beth's
headstone.

He didn't understand why he
felt guilty at the prospect of asking for her help. She was the
only one who could remotely control the laird—except for the night
Borgie had been injured.

But Lachlan seemed
reasonably calm, now. That could change in the blink of an eye,
especially if he came to resent Roan going to Beth for
advice.

"Beth, I need to see you,"
he whispered, his heart seeming to rise into his throat.

Several seconds passed
before she materialized on the far side of her headstone. He
stepped back, stunned by her desolate, ragged
appearance.

"You look...a wee jaggy," he
said unsteadily.

Her hand absently smoothed
back the hair at the top of her head. She sighed and came around
the monument, leaned against it and speculatively eyed
him.

Roan gulped past the
tightness in his throat. He suddenly wanted to leave, to walk away
and leave the poor woman alone. What right did he have to further
implicate her in the Baird/Ingliss battle?

"Beth...." Withdrawing his
left hand from the pocket, he made a feeble gesture. "This isn't
right. I shouldn't be here."

"You came about Lachlan,"
she stated dully, her gaze seeming to stare through him to some
far-off place.

"Are you all right,
lass?"

A weary smile ticked across
her lips as she met his worried gaze. "It ain't easy avoiding him,"
she quipped. "I nearly passed on, Roan."

"I'm surprised you
didn't."

"Hmmm. I certainly thought
about it." She released a sigh, her breath vaporizing in front of
her face. "But I have two very good reasons why I have to
remain."

Roan cocked his head
inquiringly.

"You and Laura," she
explained. "Actually, make that five good reasons."

"The lads?"

She nodded. "I miss them,
although it hurts like hell when I'm around them for too
long."

"I don't
understand."

For but a moment, her chin
quivered. "I'll never have a child of my own."

"I'm sorry. I didn't
think."

She released a low laugh.
"Because, Roan Ingliss, you still have trouble thinking of me as a
ghost."

"Aye, it’s true. Beth—"
Scowling, he looked down at his feet. "Aggie believes Lannie has
been to hospital." He met her steeled gaze, his brow smoothing.
"She's convinced he wants to finish Borgie off."

"What do you
think?"

Roan shrugged. "Part o' me
believes it possible."

"And...?"

"Ma heart doesn't buy it. I
know...I know...we all saw wha' he became in the house tha' night,
but...."

"But what, Roan?"

"Damn me!" he fumed, running
a hand over the top of his head. "I came here to ask you to help me
banish the mon, but it’s no' goin' to come ou' tha'
way!"

"Indecision has always been
your worst fault," she said softly, staring off to one
side.

"The mair I think abou' tha'
night, Beth, the less sense it all makes!"

Her gaze swung to his face.
"What doesn't make sense?"

"Everythin'! I know he was
angry—enraged because Borgie had come into the house, but you were
there, too. I've seen him back down just to please you,
Beth."

Walking a few paces past
Roan, she glared at the remains of Baird House. "He was too out of
control to care what he said or did that night. I'll never forget
his eyes—" Her voice caught on a sob and, squeezing her eyes shut,
she folded her arms against her middle.

Roan drew in a deep breath
of the freezing air. "Sometimes I imagine he's in ma head, Beth,
makin' me feel and say thin’s tha' I wouldn't ordinarily. I can't
get somethin' off ma mind." He walked around the statuesque figure,
faced her, and placed his hands upon her drawn in
shoulders.

"When I found him and Laura
in the attic, he said tha' Tessa had returned."

Pools of despair filled
Beth's eyes as she looked at him.

"I've been toyin' wi' this
crazy notion, Beth. Suppose...." He glanced over his shoulder, in
the direction of the house. "...Tessa's spirit was here. And wha'
if she was behind Laura tryin' to stab Lannie, and Borgie goin' ou'
the window."

"Why would—" Beth irritably
sighed. "Why would Tessa stay around? I think Lachlan would have
sensed her if she had."

"But he said she'd returned.
I remember tha' clearly. Lannie has but one thin' left to lose,
Beth. You!"

"I'm not sure what you're
trying to get at."

Roan lowered his hands then
pensively massaged the underpart of his chin. "Ye're the key,
somehow. I may be confused by a lot o' thin’s these days, but I
know tha' mon loves you mair’n anythin'. So I keep askin' maself,
why would he risk losin' you over somethin' as stupid as ma cousin
trespassin' in his bloody house? He doesn't remember actually
causin' Borgie to fly ou' the window."

"He has a selective memory,"
she said bitterly.

"He's never kept his
feelin's or faults to himself in the past, has he?"

Beth testily
shrugged.

"Now...if Tessa were around,
Beth, wha' better revenge could she perpetrate on Lannie than to
destroy yer love for him? Wha' could hurt him mair than to lose
you?"

"There's something you're
not aware of, Roan. Tessa is back, but it's not for
revenge."

The blood drained from his
face. "She's here?"

"So is Robert."

Roan swore under his
breath.

"Roan—"

A blood-curdling scream
razored the night.

Roan turned, a horrified
gaze riveted in the direction of the house. "Laura! God, Laura, I
left her in the van!"

He lit into a run, unaware
that Beth vanished. Twice he fell, further bruising his battered
body. His brain was afire with fear. Laura. She'd insisted on
remaining in the van, despite his pleas that she stay close to
him.

Damn me!

He was beelining for the van
when another scream rang out. This one possessed a feral quality,
nearly overpowering his instinct to find her. Changing direction,
he burst through the greenhouse door, then the one leading into the
hall. Guided by nothing but his honed sixth sense, he stormed up
the staircase to the third floor and turned right.

At the end of the hall,
light beckoned him from the master bedroom. He charged into the
room, oblivious to the dozens of lit candles, oblivious to Beth's
translucent form standing by the blackened fireplace. All he could
see was Laura struggling with Lachlan, whose hands cinched her
raised wrists.